Friday, 03 October 2008

The 7th birthday party

Max's 7th birthday is fast approaching. 21 October. Lately he's been insisting that his birthday is October 1st, brushing aside my insistence that I remember the day very clearly and it most definitely wasn't the first of the month. Lately he seems to have accepted reality, I think that setting the party date was what did it.

Instead of listening to the VP debate last night, Max and I had a great time making invitations. I think it was a good decision.

In contrast to last year's huge party, this year the party will be smaller and simpler. We alternate, big and small. Every other year it's a huge exhausting thing, after which we say "never again" by which we mean "not again until 2 years hence".

We're having this year's party at the local (no-kill) animal shelter. Their setup for the animals is really nice. The cat room is a free-range set of 4 connecting rooms with all sorts of kitty divertissements. The dogs get to go to outdoor runs during the day and play with other dogs.

We'll have a separate party room with crafts (provided by them! I don't have to plan it!) and a tour of the shelter. Max also gets to have an animal "guest" at his party, he picked the tortoise. Other choices were bunny, hamster, rat, guinea pig, ferret, and snake. He was really torn between the tortoise and snake, but finally decided on the tortoise as it's something he hasn't interacted with much. I was pulling for the bunny, but didn't say anything.

The base cards are a robin's egg blue scallop-edged, textured card over a plain red card. Max got to work the glue roller and stick these two pieces together.

Aren't the die cuts cute? Every time I go to Michael's I drool over those die cut systems but they're so expensive. Plus, if you've ever seen my craft room, you'd know that I'm being reasonable by not bringing more stuff into it. So instead I searched on etsy and found these from Beth at BethMarie10. She was so wonderful to work with. She had these listed in her shop and popped them into the mail really quickly for me. There are two different sets used here: one with cats, dogs, and mice, and another with party hats, cupcakes, and presents. The party hats and cupcakes were used here, the presents will be used for thank-you notes. I also did a custom order for some coordinating gift tags and a set of spiders to put up around our house for Halloween.

Now I "just" need to finish making the party favors and talk myself out of making kitty/puppy ears for all the party guests. Wish me luck.

Comments

I love the invitations, having also drooled over but been unable to justify the die-cut machines at the Michaels. Sounds like a wonderful party. All it needs is... puppy ears! Sorry, but I don't think you'll regret it!

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